Prince Wolf

by A. Katie Rose

  She didn’t chirp this time. She offered a full-throated scream of triumph.

  Spreading her wings to their fullest, she pranced about, putting full weight on her once-injured hind leg. She flapped both wings, furling them across her back, only to spread them wide again. Her wide open beak butted into me time and again as she trotted in a circle about me, her wings spread out, shading me from the midday sun.

  My dream of Ly’Tana faded, leaving behind an evil shadow of worry. I pushed it into the background and found some pleasure in watching her. I laughed and applauded her new-found health. “Go on,” I said, waving her off. “Fly.”

  I couldn’t help but admire her sheer, primitive grace. Screeching sharply, she lowered her body and launched herself into the sky. Two strong healthy wings enslaved the wind, beating up and down, carrying her up and away. Catching a warm updraft, she floated high above the trees, calling down an unknown comment to me. It didn’t matter that I didn’t understand her speech. I certainly understood her joy.

  Her huge body whipped past overhead, almost clipping the treetops, my neck popping in pain as I sought to keep her in sight. She banked up and around, her black-tipped tail streaming long behind her, her front legs tucked under her belly. I admired her freedom, and almost wished I flew up there with her.

  “You can.”

  “Maybe,” I murmured. “Maybe one day.”

  “You’re still an idiot.”

  “Why? For saving her life?”

  “No. For not believing in yourself.”

  She swooped low overhead, needing the high meadow clearing to land in, with no trees near to snarl her wings. She dropped gracefully to all four feet, her wings still flared behind her, her beak parted in a wide griffin laugh. Furling her wings, she delicately stepped toward me, her raptor eyes shining brighter than the midday sun. Grinning, I caressed her feathered cheeks, rubbed my nose against her sharp beak.

  “You know,” I said. “I never formally introduced myself. I’m Raine, an idi – er, gai-tan. A werewolf. And your name, please, miss?”

  She squawked, a long involved sound that dropped my heart into my gut.

  “I suppose all that was your name?”

  She chirped, happy.

  “Uh, well, you understand my language just fine. Or at least, this language. But, forgive me, dear one, I don’t understand yours.”

  At her crestfallen expression, I grinned. “May I call you Feria? For indeed, you are fair to behold, my sweet little girl.”

  She brightened a bit, hearing this name for her. My grin broadened. “Well, it’s either that or ‘hey, you.’”

  She laughed, her beak parted wide, her tiny raptor tongue extended, and her eagle’s eyes happy. Though I hated comparing her to Bar, she seemed less dour, more open, than he. While he brooded, she exulted. Bar took his guardianship of Ly’Tana very seriously indeed. Feria took nothing at all serious.

  Not even me.

  “Feria, you’re a delight,” I said, caressing her eyes, her ears. “But daylight’s wasting. I must move on, I’ve spent too much time in one place.”

  She reared high above me, her shriek a sharp question.

  “Sorry, lass.” I stepped back from her. “’Tis time for you to go.”

  Suddenly, her kinship to Bar grew awesomely apparent. Her open expression shut down, her eyes took on that predatory, fierce gleam, and she hissed. Long, angry and incredibly ferocious. My sweet, loving Feria vanished and an irritated griffin more than twice my size suddenly replaced her.

  Alarmed, I spread my hands. “Look,” I said. “I’m on a quest. A stupid –“

  “I beg your pardon.”

  “– bizarre and dangerous quest. I left others I love behind because I won’t place them in danger. I’ll not have you with me, or die because of me.”

  Feria softened, her eyes losing that hard, rebellious edge. She chirped. No doubt she asked to come with me. I had to harden my heart. I clamped down tight on my rebellious need for others as companions. I had to.

  “No,” I said firmly. “Go home. Go back to your mountains, your people and your life. Forget me. I’m not worth dying for.”

  She squawked, indignant.

  “Trust me,” I said, smiling. “I’m not. Go home.”

  “She thinks you are.”

  “Just shut up,” I said silently, fiercely. “Do not, do not, offer her encouragement. Keep your stupid mouth shut.”

  “No need to get angry.”

  “I see plenty –“

  Feria suddenly changed tack. Her feral eyes widened in abject horror, her beak parted in a long hiss of agonized pain. She tossed her dainty head toward her flank, as though exquisite torture ripped through her body. She screamed as though hot pinchers burned her, through and through, her wings flaring wide.

  I wilted. I recognized her intent, but I weakened anyway. Her very feminine attack cut through my male defenses, every gene in my body rising to protect the fairer gender. Despite that this particular fairer gender owned more weapons than I ever could or would have held no meaning whatsoever. I bristled to the fore, ready to protect and defend her.

  “She’s got your number.”

  “I know. I can’t help it.”

  “You’re a sucker.”

  “I know.”

  “Run off and leave her.”

  “I can’t.”

  “You’re really an idiot.”

  “I know.”

  Feria cried aloud, in pain, in agony, collapsing on her side, making me think I hadn’t healed her properly. Maybe I hadn’t, I thought, panicked, I’m just an amateur, really, what do I know of healing?

  I rushed toward her, my hands outstretched, worried, concerned, probing to find the source of her pain. I found nothing under my hands, but her screams pierced my ears and my heart.

  “You really don’t know much about females, do you?”

  “I suppose you do,” I snarled back, furious.

  “Sure I do. That’s why you were born.”

  “Now who’s the idiot?”

  “It’s still you. Now you’re the one she’s playing. Not me.”

  “I really hate you –“

  “Go ahead, see how much I care. She’s got you pegged and it’s hilarious to watch.”

  I choked on my fury, helpless. Feria indeed ran her fingers over my heartstrings, like a fiddle. To the hilt and beyond.

  “All right,” I yelled, covering my head with my arms. “Cease and desist, dammit. You can come.”

  Instantly, her screams halted. She rolled to her feet, her beak wide, with her green eyes bright and happy. She butted her head into my chest, but I scowled. With my hands on my hips, I glared.

  “You win this time,” I growled. “But only for a few days. I expect we can hunt together and gain back some strength.”

  Feria chirped, shaking her feathered mane, her wings half-furled. As she stood taller than me, she forced me to look up. Looking up at someone you scolded always took away the effect. I scolded anyway, knowing my words bounced off her as water rolled off a duck’s back.

  “You’re evil, girl,” I said. “You don’t know what I’m up against.”

  She clicked her beak and nudged my shoulder, her eagle’s eyes unconcerned. I guessed she was quite young, for a griffin, and, while owning effective feminine wiles, rather innocent. She knew coming with me might prove a deadly adventure. She just didn’t care.

  “A few days,” I warned. “No more. Then you go home. Promise?”

  A chirp and a quick nudge answered me.

  “I mean it, I want your solemn word.”

  She hissed, indignant. I did.

  I relaxed, convinced now she gave me her solemn promise. “The sun is high, and we’re late. Time we hit the road.”

  Changed into my other clothes, I loped, past the remains of our kill and up the hill. Feria launched herself into the air with a shrill cry, her shadow passing low overhead. I didn’t try to keep up with her, for I knew I never could. Finding my
ground-eating stride, I ran on, galloping over the high mountain terrain.

  Feria circled above the trees, calling down to me, her wings carrying her up and over in the cloudless, blue sky. Often she flew further, far beyond me, then circled back to find me again. Over the hills and shallow valleys I loped, sometimes climbing steep, rocky hills, to gallop easily down the far sides. Startling birds, deer, rabbits, a bear or two, I leaped thickets and ducked under heavy pines and firs. Up, northward, and ever onward I pushed, my soul a lighter burden. Both men and wolves adored company. Both halves of my inner self rejoiced in her presence.

  Feria certainly proved to be a chatty girl. She spoke almost constantly. In her mind, she made light breezy conversation, probably telling me all about her life. Chirps, hisses, squawks, clicks and her never ending, feminine moans and groans, informed me of how much she suffered through her life.

  I stifled my yawn with a heroic effort.

  “You go, dog.”

  Bar never spoke this much, I thought.

  “You wanted her along.”

  “What part of ‘shut up’ don’t you understand?”

  The fact that I had no idea what she said didn’t daunt her in the slightest. She had someone to talk to and she reveled in it. Out her beak and into my ears, Feria yakked, gossiped, chatted, confided, spoke, whispered and disclosed all of her personal, closely held secrets.

  I understood none of them.

  The ground rose and fell with low-lying hills, dotted with small forests of the ever-present fir and spruce, knotted pine and thickets of bramble. Even so, the plateau still rose gradually, slowly, in elevation. On the horizon, the distant mountains appeared low, hardly more than hills. I wasn’t fooled. They stood high enough to hide the biggest range of all behind them.

  ‘Twas not late enough in the year yet to kill the tiny purple flowers that grew over the heavy tundra. My legs disturbed late bees, working hard to fill up with the nectar they made into honey. The light mountain breeze scented with the sweet odor of pine berries and wildflowers failed to soothe my troubled mind.

  As Feria called down her conversation, I ignored her and pondered the event I witnessed as I slept. Gods above and below, Rygel lost control and all but killed Ly’Tana. What happened to him? My gut roiled with worry. How badly did he hurt her? Did Kel’Ratan and the others kill him for his crime? Perhaps the royal soldiers saw through their disguises and attacked, taking them by surprise. What in the blazes were Khalidian soldiers doing with them in the first place?

  Feria swooped by, chirping a question: was I listening? I wasn’t, but I woofed upward, hoping she believed I was. Happy, she circled higher, and her mixture of chirps, squawks, clicks, hisses and short screeches continued. Tuning her out, I fretted, inwardly biting my nails. Perhaps I was foolish to have left them as I had.

  “They wouldn’t be any safer.”

  “I know,” I muttered. “But at least I’d know.”

  “How will knowing help matters?”

  I floundered, finding and discarding words to explain what I meant, what I felt.

  “You see? There is nothing you can do for her or for any of them.”

  “Dammit.”

  “You worry too much.”

  “How can I not? I love her.”

  “You aren’t the only one.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “She has friends in high places.”

  “Don’t be cryptic. What friends?”

  Darius must have felt he said too much, for he said nothing more. I opened my mouth to berate him, but Feria forestalled me by swooping in to land, blocking my path. I skidded to a halt, ready to scold her, too.

  She screeched, cutting me off, her wings still wide, casting me in shadow. At first, I thought she warned me of danger. I relaxed when I caught that eager gleam in her green eyes.

  “What?” I asked.

  She clicked her beak, cocking her head. I spent the afternoon not understanding a thing she said, now she had no clue of what I said.

  “Bloody language barriers,” I muttered, shifting my shape once more.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked, my tone sharper than I intended.

  Feria didn’t seem to notice. Dancing from foot to foot, she chirped and screeched, ending with a series of short snaps of her beak. She waved her wings, looked back over her shoulder, to the east, then gazed back at me, expectant. I sighed.

  “I expect we’ll have to play some guessing games,” I said, running my hand through my hair. “Since you’re excited and not worried, we’re not in any danger…correct?”

  Feria chirped, waving her wings, her tail lashing from side to side.

  “Did you see something we can hunt?”

  Dipping her beak low in what appeared to be a nod, she danced from foot to foot again.

  “That’s something anyway,” I muttered. “Cattle again?”

  This time she cocked her head, growing still. She’d respond when I hit the right beast, I suspected.

  “Sheep?”

  She tilted her head the other way. I still didn’t get it right.

  “What else is up here?” I paced about, sniffing the light breeze. Only the late afternoon air with its odors of pine, tree sap and heather teased my nose. “Surely you didn’t think we’re hunting bears?”

  She screeched, clearly growing impatient with my evident stupidity. Scratching a long talon through the stony soil and grass, Feria drew a series of lines and circles. Amazed, I walked to her shoulder and stared down.

  In the heather, Feria created an image of what looked like a pig, complete with short ears, hooves and a tiny coiled tail. The drawing was so complete with detail, I gaped.

  “How’d you do that?”

  Confused, she held up for my inspection the talon with which she use to draw the picture.

  “That’s not what I meant. How did you know how to draw an image?”

  She stared back at me, her puzzlement growing. She chirped: can’t everybody?

  I began to laugh. “I could probably draw stick figures, but I obviously haven’t the talent you have.”

  “Humans aren’t the only creatures on the earth with brains.”

  “I reckon not,” I replied, still chuckling.

  Feria hissed a question. I waved my hand, negligent. “I have a voice in my head that likes to belay the obvious.”

  “How you do go on.”

  Feria straightened, eying me sidelong.

  “Yes, I’m crazy,” I replied. “But don’t worry, it’s not catching.”

  With what might be interpreted as a shrug, Feria pointed at her pig drawing, then jerked her beak toward the east.

  “Right, then,” I said, rubbing my hands together. “A family of wild unsuspecting porkers is to our east. How far away?”

  Feria drew two lines in the dirt.

  “Two miles? Very good. Very, very good.”

  I pondered the terrain, chewing my lower lip as I worked out a plan. Between us and dinner lay country that made stalking difficult. More open, with fewer thickets of trees and bramble to hide under or in, it held instead thicker, stemmed grass. More worrisome, the breeze sailed from west to east, and would carry my scent straight to them.

  “I’ll have to circle around them,” I said. “Come at them from the north. You fly up and circle over their location, to pinpoint them for me. Not so low they can sense you, just out of their range. When you see I’m close, you drop down, fast. Perhaps we might catch them between us.”

  Fierce eagle eyes lit with excitement, Feria raised her right taloned foot up to me. At first, her gesture confused me and I blinked. Her foot didn’t come down, and she waited, patient. What did she want? She held it as though about ready to strike across my face –

  Insight struck like a bolt from the blue.

  Grinning, I clasped her hand, avoiding the deadly tips, with my own strong right grip, my thumb sliding between the equivalent of her thumb and forefinger. “Luck,” I said, chuckling.

  Sh
e chirped: luck.

  Thin dust blew about me as she took to the air, her huge wings whipping my hair back from my face with gale-force winds. I squinted against the tempest, shading my eyes as she rose higher, her front legs tucked beneath her shoulders, her lithe, leonine hindquarters and black-tipped tail following behind. No wonder Ly’Tana always watched Bar in flight. No other creature, save perhaps the dragon, could be so dangerously, awesomely beautiful.

  With a rueful sigh, I found my paws and loped north. This idea of hunting as a team intrigued me. As Darius pointed out, I needed the extra weight to carry me through the high, snowy passes. Hunting and eating every day, previously a notion, could now become a fact of life. Feria’s trim body, while not seriously underweight, had gone through a great deal of trauma. She, too, would benefit from extra meals.

  “Thinking to keep her with you?”

  “Of course not,” I answered sharply. “Just for a few days.”

  “She can really help.”

  “Don’t start with me.”

  I glanced up, finding Feria circling tightly over a shallow valley between two rounded hillocks. She flew lower to the ground than what I had suggested, yet I found little to fault. Pigs rooted around the underbrush for acorns, nuts, grubs, small rodents, and they owned very poor eyesight. I estimated I needed to skirt the northern hill and charge them from the eastern end of the tiny vale. Responding accordingly, the feral hogs might follow the path of least resistance, and flee straight down the valley. Feria, watching all from above and reading my plan, could drop down into their flight path.

  Caught between two predators and two hills, they stood no chance of escaping. She and I would feast on pork this night.

  “A good plan. Well done.”

  “So,” I said, running hard, my tongue flapping.

  “So?”

  “Who are Ly’Tana’s friends in high places?”

  Of course, Darius refused to answer.

  “That’s one way of shutting you up,” I muttered.

  The plan worked better than I dared to hope. When I burst out from the undergrowth, the pig family of a boar, three or four sows and numerous half-grown piglets, bolted down the valley. They ran fast, faster than I’d expected and had I been alone I might have gone hungry that afternoon. Feria dropped from the sky with lightning speed, her jaws and talons agape, her wings shadowing all.